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Hypnosis Past and Present

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This essay will be answering the question 'What is Hypnosis?'. It will describe the psychological and physical aspects of hypnosis and will be discussing the role of relaxation in hypnotherapy.
It will give a brief history of hypnosis. It will look back over the century's to the many people who have influenced the progression of hypnosis, to how it is seen and practiced to this day. It will discuss the role of relaxation and what happens to achieve relaxation.

What is Hypnosis?
Hypnosis is nothing new, in fact it has been widely practiced since the early 1700”s
Most people are familiar with the term 'mesmerized', which in fact came from an Australian doctor named Franz Anton Mesmer who lived from 1733-1815 (1)
Mesmer had a theory that he could heal people with the use of magnets and Franziska Osterlin was his first patient in 1774, followed shortly in 1777 to a young lady musician who had been born blind and was unable to be treated by any doctor. Mesmer did in fact restore the ladies site but in the process she lost the ability to play the piano. Mesmer was accused of magic and was forced to leave Austria. (2)
Mesmer moved to France and by the 1780's he moved away from using magnets and instead used a 'healing tree'. He was evaluated by King Louis XVI who concluded that his results were due to individual fantasy and in 1785 he was forced to leave the city where for the next 30 years he lived a secluded life. (2)
Shortly before Mesmers death in 1815 he was visited by Karl Christian Wolfart to learn of his ideas and methods. It was suggested by Abbe Faria that it was the suggestions used by the practitioners rather than the magnetism that was causing the desired affect. (3)

By the mid 1800s hypnosis was used to relieve pain.
A London physician John Elliotson, who was born in 1791 and later died in 1868, performed 1,834 surgical procedures painlessly (4)

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